This week on Good Food, host Evan Kleiman talks with Rene Redzepi of
Noma, recently named the best restaurant in the world. Plus Jonathan
Gold takes us to a restaurant in Santa Monica and Mary Sue Milliken
shares her recipe for lima bean succotash.

FROM THIS EPISODE

Noma, a restaurant in Coppenhagen, was recently named the best restaurant in the world. This week on Good Food, host Evan Kleiman talks with Noma's chef, Rene Redzepi about his unique Nordic cuisine. Rasmus Lee tells us about typical Danish food. He's the owner of Hygge, the Danish bakery in Downtown L.A. Chefs Mark Peel, Eric Greenspan, Octavio Becerra and Akira Hirose compete in a dessert contest. Evan takes us behind the scenes of a Top Chef-style "Quickfire" competition. John Sedlar
of the restaurant Rivera has completely reworked his menu to
reflect the 3,000 year old history of Los Angeles' cuisine. Many mammals
eat the placenta after birth. Sara Pereira explains the benefits of ingesting the placenta. French cuisine is steeped in a very codified history. Constance Jouven explains how Le Fooding is mixing it up in France. Plus mixologist Derek Brown shares the history of using eggs in cocktails. And Mary Sue Miliken of The Border Grill gives us a recipe for lima bean succotash.

This week Evan Kleiman judged the DineLA Quickfire Finale along with Sherry Yard, of Wolfgang Puck, and Russ Parsons of the LA Times. Chefs Eric Greenspan, Akira Hirose, Mark Peel and Octavio Becerra competed in a pastry competition. Eric Greenspan won with his Elvis-inspired peanut butter, bacon and banana moonpie. More pictures of the event are on the Good Food Blog.

Jonathan Gold is the Pulitzer Prize-winning food writer for the LA
Weekly. This week he reviews The Yard, a gastropub in Santa Monica.
The restaurant has a largely farmers market-drive menu which serves duck
confit with nectarines or pears (seasonal). The are some year-round
favorites like spaghetti with turkey bolognese and Carolina-style ribs.

John Sedlar is the chef/owner of Rivera in Downtown Los Angeles. He recently revamped his menus, dividing his service into three areas: Sangre (Spanish & North African), Samba (South American), Playa (Coastal).

Sara Pereira is a pre and post-natal massage therapist and a licensed placenta encapsulation specialist. She dehydrates the placenta and pulverizes it into capsules. There is no data or research behind ingesting the placenta, but it's practiced widely in Asian cultures.

Good Food contributor Eddie Lin cooked and ate his wife's placenta. Read his story here.

Constance Jouven is a member of Le Fooding in France. Le Fooding is a movement that exists as a counterpoint to the codified French cuisine of the Michelin tradition. They publish a guidebook and a hold events like Le Grand Le Fooding. The most recent one featured San Francisco versus New York.

DerekBrown is a
Washington DC area mixologist. He owns the bar The Passenger, as well
as the 18 seat Columbia Room housed in the same building. Derek
treats his cocktail menus much the way a private chef would, parsing
courses and pairing cocktails with food.

Egg whites are frequently used in cocktails, including the Pisco Sour.

In cocktail shaker filled with ice, combine egg white, Pisco, simple syrup, and lemon juice. Cover, shake vigorously for 15 seconds, and strain into six-ounce cocktail glass. Top with a few drops of bitters.

Mary Sue Milliken is chef and co-owner of The Border Grill (1445 4th St., Santa Monica, (310) 451-1655). She is buying fresh lima beans from McGrath Family Farms for a succotash. Sauté the lima beans with corn and diced butternut squash. If you plan to serve the succotash warm, use butter. For a cold salad sauté with olive oil. Mary Sue likes to start the succotash with onion.

David Karp is a pomologist with UC Riverside. On the Market Report, he talks about grapes in the muscat family like Sweet Melissa and Sweet Scarlet.